Satisfaction and loyalty: a study of business passengers

The aviation industry has grown enormously and it is highly competitive not just in Thailand but all over the world. A number of Asian national flag air carriers, especially the airlines from the Middle East and East Asia, have tried their best to dominate air transportation industry in Thailand, which includes Thailand’s national flag air carrier itself and also other airlines in Asia, in order to be the first choice carrier for passengers. Hence, every airline has set goals to enhance service quality and has tried to be the winner in order to have their own loyal passengers. To better understand the passenger, this research study aims firstly to examine the demographic factors influencing passenger decisions when choosing an airline, secondly, to investigate the level of customer satisfaction towards the 7P’s marketing factors on the satisfaction of the business class frequent flyers, and, ultimately, to explore the most essential factor influencing the customer decisions when choosing the airline, as well as to explore the factor that might stop the passengers from choosing an airline. The participants for the study were 105 business class passengers who are current members (Gold class) of the airline’s frequent flyer program travelling to/from London, the United Kingdom (London Heathrow Airport: LHR). Questionnaires were utilized as the research instrument and were comprised of three parts; the demographic information of the participants, the passenger satisfaction towards the airline using the seven factors from the theory of marketing mix 7P’s, and the comments and suggestions in an open-ended question part. The study was conducted during February - March 2019 by purposive sampling method during the flights. The findings reveal that the business class passengers were most satisfied with ‘direct flight’, and were least satisfied with ‘Wi-fi fee’. The findings also reveal that there were relationships between demographic data, namely, gender, age, occupation, nationality, monthly income range, purpose of traveling, and the person who makes the decision for the airfare, and the business class frequent flyers’ satisfaction towards each of the service marketing mix 7P’s, namely product, price, place, promotion, people, process, and physical evidence. There was a statistically significant difference with respect to age, nationality, monthly income range, and the person who makes the decision for the airfare with the overall satisfaction of business class passenger towards seven marketing mix 7P’s factors. However, gender, occupation, and purpose of travelling had no statistically significant difference with overall satisfaction of business class passenger towards seven marketing mix 7P’s factors. All the findings help THAI to get a better understanding into what satisfies, and what does not satisfy their business class passengers, and helps the airline’s executives better hold their current business class frequent flyers in the fierce competition in the airline business.